Congrats to Brian Dupuis (a.k.a. “DUP”), who came from behind to win the Irish Trojan’s first annual College Bowl Pick ‘em contest, finishing with 35 of a possible 50 points and clinching victory when the buzzer sounded on Texas’s national-championship victory over USC.
Josh Rubin, who would have won the contest if either Florida State had won the Orange Bowl or USC had won the Rose Bowl, finished second with 34 points.
Mark Gardner — who, like Dupuis, correctly picked both Penn State and Texas — finished third with 33 points.
Eric S., the only contestant to guess the exact combined score of the championship game (79), finished fourth, winning the tiebreaker over Greg Rauen and Alex Whitfield as a result of that prediction.
Doc, Joanna Mari, Courtney and Matt Scarborough round out the Top 10. Complete standings here.
Not a single contestant managed to correctly predict all four BCS bowls. Ohio State, West Virginia and Texas were all considered underdogs, according to the aggregate picks of all contestants.
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January 5th, 2006 at 6:11:55 am
It was fun. Glad I did it.
January 5th, 2006 at 7:11:35 am
::grumble:: ;-)
January 5th, 2006 at 9:17:53 am
Fun to take part; thanks to Brendan for hosting.
Sympathies to all the Trojan fans here
January 5th, 2006 at 9:42:01 am
sorry.. no “two-pete”…..
January 5th, 2006 at 10:31:46 am
I was thinking about Leinert’s “We’re still the better team” and remembering Pat Ewing saying pretty much the same thing after the Villanova catastrophe in 1985.
Though Ewing and the Hoyas slamma’d the Jamma’s in winning the title the previous year, most people remember him as a loser, in part because he never won anything after that Villanova fiasco.
But to the particular statement -
being the better team is no caveat at a time like this, it is no comfort at all.
Specifically, being the better team IS the problem. Given the choice of being the “better” team or the “winning” team, only losers would find solace in being “better”.
I agree with someone earlier: Ryan Leaf. Maybe Todd Marinovich?
January 5th, 2006 at 10:34:19 am
Keep Matty away from the Coca Cola, Jazz. And the chocolate…
January 5th, 2006 at 11:28:06 am
Yes indeed Coach, as with Touchdown Todd before him, I could envision a raging Coke habit in Leinert’s future.
Not the Cola type.
January 5th, 2006 at 2:10:44 pm
My worst performance in any fantasy/pick ‘em game. Ever. How humiliating.
As for the Leaf/Leinert thing, here’s my $0.02:
I think Leinert will be an NFL bust, but not for the same reasons as Leaf. I think Leaf was just a headcase and couldn’t handle the NFL pressure. Conversely, I don’t think Leinart has the physical skills to compete in today’s NFL, and I have two examples as to why.
First, he is far too slow. Yes, say what you will about Peyton Manning, but Leinert is no Peyton in the pocket. The only possible way I see Leinert being halfway successful in the NFL is if a team completely revamps their offense to suit his needs (standing and passing like Manning or Marino before him). However this will not occur because . . .
He has Steve Young Syndrome. From the games I watched this year (granted, I only watched a couple), I saw Leinert take two big hits — one in the ASU game and one last night. After both he was obviously out of it. Put Leinert on a crappy NFL team, he’ll get hit like that countless times (see David Carr). Any D-Coordinator worth his shorts would pressure Leinert all day considering his lack of scrambling ability.
One more thing — and this is total speculation — but I question his desire. In a couple interviews I’ve read him saying stuff like he’s “content” and “happy with where [he’s] at.” Maybe he goes the route of Tim Couch and joins the USC staff?
Anyway, just my $0.02 like I said. I just never see him turning into anything special in the next level.
Now Bush on the other hand . . .
January 5th, 2006 at 2:27:50 pm
I’m surprised Andrew Long did as poorly as I did considering that he knows a lot more about college football than I do.
January 5th, 2006 at 2:41:19 pm
Oh man, i just learned the funniest thing because of all this post game Texas hype. Apparently the phrase “Don’t mess with Texas” was a slogan used by the state transportation department to promote an anti-littering campaign. So the next time a Texan tells you not to mess with their state, make sure to promise not to litter.
January 5th, 2006 at 2:51:15 pm
Ricardo, admittedly I did do horrible in this contest. I did not pick many upsets. However, that was mostly because there was no spread, and I am used to picking college games on the spread. Had Brendan used the point spread for each game, I would have made many different picks and would have had a much better record (e.g., for the BCS games, I had Texas, West Virginia, and Florida State to cover, while I would have picked Notre Dame to win, so I would’ve gone 3-1 there instead of 0-4).
January 5th, 2006 at 3:03:30 pm
Re: “Don’t Mess with Texas,” that is funny but true. The original shirts with that slogan have a picture of a highway or something like that (probably the Texas DOT symbol). Hey, not a bad contrivance for a public agency! I would say it blows “give a hoot, don’t pollute” out of the water for pop culture appeal.
January 5th, 2006 at 3:22:44 pm
BK-
I agree with you. I’ve seen Leinert play a few times and it doesn’t seem like he can handle the pressure or avoid it all that well on his own. Don’t get me wrong here - he’s an excellent passer - especially when you give him time in the pocket, but I don’t think he’ll amount to much in the NFL.
January 5th, 2006 at 6:22:12 pm
bink, look at last year: Leinart had a brand new offensive line with very little starting experience, and all he did was go out and win the Heisman Trophy. NFL speculations aside, your observations of him are incredibly backward. Leinart is not Michael Vick or Vince Young, but he can avoid the rush long enough to find an open receiver, and he’s deadly on rollout passes.
January 5th, 2006 at 9:51:34 pm
Did anyone else notice a Trojan in the news in Pennsylvania? A Trojan by the name of Lynn Swann who has now thrown his hat in the ring for governor in 2006?
Very, VERY interesting. I’m finding out a lot of my favorite players were Trojans.
January 6th, 2006 at 12:03:21 pm
Hm, yeah, I didn’t get to check him out last year too much… but I guess you have a point. I mentioned he’s a great passer - which is evident in the way that he can thread the ball through a few defensive backs to place it in the hands of his receivers. I still don’t think he’s going to have a great run of it in the NFL though. Again though, that’s going on only the few times I’ve seen him though.
January 6th, 2006 at 4:06:58 pm
Brendan,
Your unsophisticated football pool lacked sufficient complexity to fully activate Andrew’s ethereal powers of prognostication.
Andrew,
After power scrolling for the better part of this afternoon, I finally located the apparent source of your dissatisfaction.
If it’s not too early, or forward, to suggest songs for your eventual wedding reception, might I nominate Steely Dan’s “Hey, Nineteen”?
January 6th, 2006 at 7:24:33 pm
Ummm, I don’t get it.